Fox News In A Pickle Over MT GOP Gianforte’s Assault On A Reporter

When Republican Congressional candidate Greg Gianforte assaulted reporter Ben Jacobs in front of a Fox News crew, then lied about it, Fox News was put in a very delicate position.

Fox News reporter Alicia Acuna became an eyewitness to what is probably the biggest political story of the day last night when Gianforte assaulted reporter Ben Jacobs of The Guardian on the eve of a "closer than it should be" special election to fill a vacant seat in the House of Representatives.

At that point, Gianforte grabbed Jacobs by the neck with both hands and slammed him into the ground behind him. Faith, Keith and I watched in disbelief as Gianforte then began punching the man, as he moved on top the reporter and began yelling something to the effect of “I’m sick and tired of this!”

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To be clear, at no point did any of us who witnessed this assault see Jacobs show any form of physical aggression toward Gianforte, who left the area after giving statements to local sheriff’s deputies.

The Gianforte campaign issued a statement that contradicted Acuna, claiming that it was “Jacobs’ aggressive behavior” of grabbing Gianforte’s wrist that “created this scene.” The Gianforte statement also claimed he asked Jacobs “to lower the recorder, Jacobs declined.”

So, a Republican candidate for Congress physically assaulted a reporter for asking a question the candidate didn’t like, lied about what happened and was criminally charged. All on the night before a big election that both parties see as a bellwether for future political fortunes.

What a predicament for Fox News!

As Think Progress pointed out, Fox & Friends did its best on behalf of the home team:

Fox and Friends only informed its roughly 1.5 million viewers about the story during news summaries. While Gianforte’s assault charge was mentioned in passing, Jacobs’ version of events never was. The eyewitness account provided by Fox News journalists also went unmentioned; there was no indication the eyewitnesses were even asked to join the show. But the since-debunked statement from Gianforte’s campaign was featured prominently.

Later, someone at Fox apparently decided the network couldn’t not have Acuna on. So she visited Happening Now and gave a pretty straightforward narrative of what happened. She did note that Gianforte’s campaign claimed that Jacobs was “much more aggressive” than what she had “described.”

The Right is quite happy with Gianforte having assaulted Jacobs – I’m seeing repeated posts from angry conservatives who wish that more politicians would physically attack the press in this manner. They’re not sorry at all, and they’re hoping that Gianforte wins his seat easily to boot, so they can continue their gloating in the spirit of the Year of the Bully. Rush Limbaugh went on at length about this today, describing Gianforte as a man and Jacobs as a wimp, and stating that Montana voters would of course side with Gianforte, and that it wouldn’t matter anyway since 70 percent of the state has already turned in absentee ballots.

Laura Ingraham is trying to make points for herself by getting into the tiniest of definitions with Alicia Acuna and then trying to make it sound like Acuna retracted her story. In reality, Acuna has stated to Ingraham that she isn’t sure if Gianforte’s assault happened with his hands completely around Jacobs’ neck. Maybe his hands were just on either side of his neck as he was throwing him to the deck and then repeatedly punching him. Ingraham thinks this is a major coup – Acuna is admitting that she doesn’t think he grabbed him by the neck! And it’s an irrelevancy. Gianforte lost his temper and grabbed Jacobs and assaulted him. Period. Full Stop. Ingraham is also (as is Limbaugh) trying to make it sound like Jacobs should have hit Gianforte back if he was a real man. Sure. And then both men would have been arrested. Instead, Jacobs acted like an adult, and reported Gianforte to the police, who took statements from multiple people and then charged Gianforte with misdemeanor assault. Somewhere in this, Gianforte’s staff decided it would be best to pull a Trump and try to redirect the discussion to a lie about whether Jacobs actually initiated the contact.

Likely result will be that Gianforte still wins his seat but serves under a cloud, including pleading guilty to a reduced charge. And that Fox News plays up the situation as yet another case of wimpy Dems losing.

Not mentioned in last night’s three-hour comedy block in prime time and not mentioned by the three useful idiots on the curvy couch this morning. Faux — all the fair and balanced news we decide to tell you about.